Exec summary: Scroll down for our week ahead calendar, Sunday's Kennedy Center Honors ceremony, Nexstar's deal to buy Tribune, and much more...
REMEMBERING 41 A presidential funeral
This week, for the first time in nearly 12 years, America will lay a former president to rest. George H.W. Bush will lie in state in the Capitol Rotunda from Monday evening until Wednesday morning.
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Then there will be a memorial service at Washington National Cathedral. Bush spoke at the most recent presidential memorial there -- a service for Gerald Ford in January 2007.
Ford passed away "just after a midterm election in which Democrats won Congress," the NYT's Peter Baker tweeted. "His departure occasioned a moment of bipartisan coming together — but just a moment."
More than a decade later, in this twittery age, state funerals are still television events -- bringing people together and bearing witness to American greatness. The goodbye to Sen. John McCain earlier this year was a "where were you when?" moment. And Bush's farewell will receive even more attention.
"You know, we're not a very historical society," Frank Sesno told me on Sunday's "Reliable Sources." And we live at a time when events fly by in real time, "instantaneously, and then it's gone." So memorials, like this week's tributes to Bush 41, are a rare chance to "reflect on a life and to think what service to country actually looks like," Sesno said.
Wednesday in DC, Thursday in Houston
After the DC service on Wednesday, the former president will be flown back to Texas. There will a memorial service in Houston. Then, per CNN's story here, he will be laid to rest at his presidential library in College Station, Texas, "where his wife, Barbara Bush, and daughter Robin, who died of leukemia as a child, are buried."
Monday's morning shows
CNN's "New Day" anchors John Berman and Alisyn Camerota will be live from DC on Monday. So will "CBS This Morning" co-anchors John Dickerson and Norah O'Donnell. CBS co-anchor Bianna Golodryga will be in Houston. (Gayle King is on some pre-planned time off.)
On NBC, Savannah Guthrie will co-anchor from DC starting Monday through Wednesday. Later in the day, ABC's "World News Tonight" anchor David Muir will be live from DC... with Amy Robach in Houston...
Interviews with past presidents
George W. Bush, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama taped interviews with Norah O'Donnell in the past 18 months, knowing the Q&A's would only air after Bush 41's passing. Those interviews formed the basis of this double-length segment on Sunday's "60 Minutes." Obama has granted very few interviews since leaving office last year, so it's notable that he participated in this.
When a member of "The Presidents Club" dies, you naturally want to hear from the other members. CNN's Jamie Gangel sat down with both Clinton and Bush 43 for her Saturday night special report...
When the news broke on Friday...
As the NYT's Peter Baker reported here, "Bush had been fading in the last few days." 41's last words were to Bush 43 via speaker phone.
On Friday night a small number of reporters were in position in Houston, on standby for the announcement. Many others were caught by surprise when Jim McGrath, Bush 41's longtime spokesman, announced the former president's passing at 11:48 p.m. ET.
It was too late for some major papers to rip up the front page. But all three cable news channels were still live. Don Lemon, Steve Kornacki and Shannon Bream reported the news on CNN, MSNBC and Fox respectively. Lemon went live to CNN's Jamie Gangel, and then to Dana Bash, who was standing by in Houston. He stayed live until 3 a.m. ET, when CNN showed the HBO documentary "41."
On Fox, Bret Baier and others joined Bream's special coverage. Meantime, Kornacki anchored a lengthy special report for NBC stations across the country, featuring an obit by Lester Holt. The special reports at midnight on ABC and CBS were much shorter. ABC's cut-in was led by correspondent Lynda Lopez, who sometimes appears on ABC's overnight newscast. Byron Pitts anchored a special edition of "Nightline" at 12:30. On CBS, one of the network's L.A. station anchors, Sharon Tay, led a short special report about Bush's passing. In these moments, you see how prepared the networks are... or are not... for big breaking news stories. TVNewser has details here...
Reflections from veteran reporters
Bush was "available and accessible" to the press corps, former White House correspondent Charles Bierbauer said on "Reliable."
"He also understood our job," Sam Donaldson added. "Presidents don't like everything they read or see, but he understood what we were about." | | Read Jackie Wattles' story about the segment here...
A very different media environment
Bush 41 was the last president to serve in a pre-WWW, pre-Drudge, pre-Fox News world. "This was before the age of the Internet and before cable exploded into what it is now," Sesno said on "Reliable." He described genial relationships between the W.H. press secretary and the press corps that are hard to picture today...
>> One more point from Sesno: H.W. Bush "actually believed in government..."
>> But was it really a "kinder, gentler time," as some have said? Donaldson and I discussed how Bush's 1988 campaign trafficked in fear-mongering via the infamous Willie Horton ad. We talked about Lee Atwater and Roger Ailes' roles... Video here...
41 versus 45
So many of the conversations about Bush's life and legacy are a contrast to President Trump. There's just no way to pretend otherwise.
WaPo's Greg Jaffe captured it this way: "In death, Bush becomes a yardstick for President Trump."
This came up all weekend long. Witness Maureen Dowd: "Covering H.W.'s White House was wildly different than covering Donald Trump's," she wrote. "A Trump day bursts with a fusillade of huge news stories, often starting at dawn with a crazy tweet and usually involving the amorality, criminality and vulgarity of the president and his circle. I could go for months without getting a juicy story out of 41's White House..."
FOR THE RECORD, PART ONE
-- Jim Rutenberg's Monday column: "News Networks Fall Short on Climate Story as Dolphins Die on the Beach..." (NYT)
-- "Astrophysicist and author Neil deGrasse Tyson has denied allegations of sexual misconduct made against him by three women..." (CNN)
-- "Fox Broadcasting and National Geographic, which air the popular science program 'Cosmos,' said they would investigate the allegations..." (NYT)
Media week ahead calendar
Monday: BI's Ignition conference gets underway in NYC...
Monday: Tim Cook receives an ADL award...
Monday night: Redskins v. Eagles in MNF!
Wednesday: Sundar Pichai testifies on Capitol Hill...
Thursday: Golden Globe nominations will be announced at 8 a.m. ET...
Thursday: A key hearing in the DOJ's appeal of US v. AT&T...
Friday: "Divide and Conquer: The Story of Roger Ailes" premieres in theaters, on demand and online...
Tribune + Nexstar
Tribune Media is trying again. Three months after its deal to sell itself to Sinclair collapsed, the TV station owner is trying to sell itself to Nexstar Media Group. The $4.1 billion deal "would make it the largest local U.S. TV station operator," Reuters' Carl O'Donnell and Liana B. Baker reported Sunday. Their scoop was matched by the WSJ and other outlets later in the day.
DETAILS: Per Reuters, "Nexstar outbid private equity firm Apollo Global Management LLC with an all-cash offer that values Tribune at around $46.50 per share, three sources said. Tribune shares ended trading on Friday at $40.26..."
THE DEAL: "The deal is expected to be announced as early as Monday," per the WSJ...
Inside the Miami Herald... | | Julie K. Brown, who wrote "Perversion of Justice" for the Miami Herald, told me how she tracked down sources and obtained documents about the Jeffrey Epstein case. "I had to try to get people to trust me," she said. In some cases, the sources feared that the Herald's editors or the paper's owner, McClatchy, would kill the story to appease Epstein. They feared that "someone in power" would intervene, Brown said. Thankfully, the story WAS published. Watch our Q&A here...
"Considerable impact"
Brown's reporting was in part about the "secret plea agreement orchestrated by then-Miami U.S. Attorney Alexander Acosta," Herald editor Mindy Marques wrote in this Sunday letter from the editor.
Acosta is now the US labor secretary. She noted that Brown's story "has already had considerable impact. Washington lawmakers from both sides of the aisle — from Debbie Wasserman Schultz to Marco Rubio — have raised questions about Acosta's fitness for the office he currently occupies. And it has apparently eliminated him from any consideration for attorney general..."
There's still more to learn...
"The reporting was all the more difficult due to the considerable efforts to keep details" secret, Marques wrote.
As Brown noted on "Reliable," the Herald is "still fighting in court" to unseal some of the cases involving Epstein...
| | Piecing together the Trump-Russia story
Michael Cohen's recent plea deal contained "pretty stunning new information" about Trump's ties to Russia, Michael Isikoff said on "Reliable."
Isikoff and Garrett Graff joined me and described how they try to connect the dots for viewers. "There are lies on top of lies" being exposed, Graff said. Watch the segment here...
--> A related headline by the AP's Eric Tucker: "Trump aides caught in web of deception over Russia contacts..."
In case you missed it...
How to catch up on Sunday's "Reliable Sources:" Watch the video clips on CNN.com... Listen via Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, or your favorite podcast app... Or watch the whole episode via CNNgo or VOD...
FOR THE RECORD, PART TWO
-- Sunset magazine, a California icon, is struggling after being sold from Time Inc to private equity firm Regent, Meg James reports... (LAT)
-- This high school newspaper in Arkansas was "suspended for publishing an investigation into football players' transfers..." (BuzzFeed News)
Khashoggi's private messages | | CNN obtained the correspondence between slain Saudi writer Jamal Khashoggi and Montreal-based activist Omar Abdulaziz. "The messages shared by Abdulaziz, which include voice recordings, photos and videos, paint a picture of a man deeply troubled by what he regarded as the petulance of his kingdom's powerful young prince," CNN's Nina dos Santos and Michael Kaplan wrote.
Khashoggi and Abdulaziz "had begun planning an online youth movement that would hold the Saudi state to account." But Abdulaziz believes their WhatsApp conversations "may have been intercepted by Saudi authorities." Read the full story here...
ICYMI: The story behind the Moonves story
Do you recognize this studio? I borrowed Don Lemon's set for a group interview with all three of the NYT reporters behind the new Les Moonves investigation. | | I wrote about the interview in Friday's newsletter, but if you missed it, here's my full story plus the in-depth podcast conversation. Ellen Gabler, Rachel Abrams and James B. Stewart detailed how they broke the story about Moonves's last days at CBS.
"The story is just a good reminder to keep being persistent," Gabler said. To keep calling and texting sources. Listen to the podcast via Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or TuneIn...
An apology
I made a mistake in Friday night's newsletter, so I want to correct it in an equally prominent spot in this edition.
In this letter I like to include submissions from lots of reporters and producers and editors at CNN. On Friday one of those people sent me a couple paragraphs from and a link to The Verge, just wanting to make sure I saw the article. But I thought it was a submission for the newsletter and added it just before I hit send. As soon as the newsletter came out, the person who'd sent me the paragraphs emailed me and pointed out the problem.
I should have caught this before hitting send, and I'm deeply sorry. The text actually belonged to Patricia Hernandez, who wrote an excellent story about Ariana Grande's launch of "thank u, next" via a live streaming event on YouTube. This "may be the first time the live streaming format has been used for a high-profile music video," Hernandez wrote.
The problem was, Friday night's item neglected to include those all-important quote marks. When I realized this, I was mortified. I reached out to The Verge right away to apologize. Most importantly, here's the link to Hernandez's story -- it's definitely worth a read!
This year's Kennedy Center Honors
The 41st Annual Kennedy Center Honors were held in DC on Sunday night... Cher, Philip Glass, Reba McEntire, and Wayne Shorter received awards... and "Hamilton" co-creators Lin-Manuel Miranda, Thomas Kail, Andy Blankenbuehler, and Alex Lacamoire accepted a special honors for their work. Details here... | | The Washington Post has a full report from the red carpet... It notes that for the second straight year, in a break from tradition, the president skipped the event.
As usual, the festivities will be televised later... CBS will show this year's Honors on December 26...
| | Baldwin back on "SNL"
On "SNL," Alec Baldwin's Donald Trump "found himself on a balcony in Argentina with first lady Melania Trump, played by Cecily Strong," Frank Pallotta writes.
If you missed it, here's the cold open...
A+ Netflix spoof
Megan Thomas emails: Saturday Night Live had several really funny skits, but the Netflix commercial for world domination was among the top... Watch it here if you missed it... "Our goal is the endless scroll... By the time you've reached the bottom of our menu, there's new shows at the top, and thus the singularity has been achieved..." | |
Critiquing the critics
Brian Lowry emails: The Baffler ran a piece about TV criticism that, as often happens in these cases, obscured its most salient points thanks to its snark and cheap shots. The main issues – for instance that critics are dealing with "peak TV" by writing more positive, even effusive reviews, at the expense of negative ones – are legitimate subjects for conversation. And realistically, a web-based (and thus traffic-driven) culture provides more incentive to cater to shows with a passionate fan base, which inevitably means a retrenchment of coverage elsewhere. As former USA Today critic Robert Bianco tweeted, "The article makes a valid point about the risks of the kind of selective criticism many have adopted to deal with the program flood..."
Eye on this week's Golden Globe noms...
Brian Lowry emails: As THR's Scott Feinberg noted here, the HFPA seems less likely this year to help establish frontrunners than simply help thin the herd...
Chopra and Jonas update! | | Last but not least: "One day after marrying in a Christian ceremony, celebrity power couple Priyanka Chopra and Nick Jonas were continuing their wedding festivities Sunday evening with a traditional Hindu ceremony," CNN's Swati Gupta writes... Read all about it here...
That's a wrap on today's letter. Thank you for reading. Send me your feedback anytime. See you tomorrow!
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